Myanmar units of measurement

The traditional Burmese units of measurement were a system of measurement used in Myanmar.

Myanmar was one of three countries that had not adopted the International System of Units (SI) metric system as their official system of weights and measures according to the 2010 CIA Factbook.[1] However, in June 2011, U Kyaw Htoo from the Burmese government's Ministry of Commerce began discussing proposals to reform the measurement system in Burma and adopt the kilogram for domestic trade, reasoning that this would simplify foreign trade which it conducts exclusively in metric;[2] and in October 2013, Pwint San, Deputy Minister for Commerce, announced that the country was preparing to adopt the metric system.[3]

As of 2006, Burmese government web pages in English used imperial and metric units inconsistently. For instance, the Ministry of Construction used miles to describe the length of roads[4] and square feet for the size of houses,[5] but square kilometres for the total land area of new town developments in Yangon City.[5] As of 2010 the Ministry of Agriculture used acres for land areas.[6] As of 2009 the Ministry of Foreign Affairs used kilometres (with mile equivalents in parentheses) to describe the dimensions of the country.[7]

Length
Table of length units
Unit Metric Imperial/US Ratio to
previous
Burmese Romanized
ဆံချည် sanchi 79.375 μm 3+1⁄8 thou/mil
နှမ်း hnan 793.75 μm 31+1⁄4 thou/mil 10
မုယော muyaw 4.7625 mm 3⁄16 in 6
လက်သစ် let thit 19.05 mm 3⁄4 in; one digit 4
မိုက် maik 152.4 mm 6 in; one shaftment 8
ထွာ htwa 228.6 mm 9 in; one span 1.5
တောင် taung 457.2 mm 1+1⁄2 ft; one cubit 2
လံ lan 1.8288 m 6 ft; one fathom 4
တာ ta 3.2004 m 10+1⁄2 ft 1.75
ဥသဘ out-thaba
(from Pali usabha)		 64.008 m 70 yd 20
ကောသ kawtha
(from Pali kosa)		 1.28016 km 0.795455 mi 20
ဂါ၀ုတ် ga-wout
(from Pali gāvuta)		 5.12064 km 3.18182 mi;
about one league		 4
ယူဇနာ yuzana
(from Pali yūjanā)		 20.48256 km 12.7273 mi 4

Mass
Table of mass units
Unit Metric Imperial/US Ratio to
previous
Burmese Romanized
ရွေးလေး yway lay 136.078 mg 2.1 grain
ရွေးကြီး yway gyi 272.155 mg 4.2 grain 2
ပဲသား petha 1.02058 g 15.75 grain 3.75
မူးသား mutha 2.04117 g 31.5 grain 2
မတ်သား mattha 4.08233 g 63 grain 2
ငါးမူးသား nga mutha[N 1] 8.16466 g 0.288 oz 2
ကျပ်သား kyattha[N 2] 16.3293 g 0.576 oz 2
အဝက်သား awettha 204.117 g 7.2 oz 12.5
အစိတ်သား aseittha 408.233 g 14.4 oz 2
ငါးဆယ်သား ngase tha 816.466 g 1.8 lb 2
ပိဿာ peittha[N 3] 1.63293 kg 3.6 lb 2
အချိန်တစ်ရာ achein taya 163.293 kg 360 lb 100
  1. Literally "five mutha", but in fact it is only four.
  2. Traditionally known as a tical in English.
  3. Traditionally known as a viss in English.

Volume
Table of volume units
Unit Metric Imperial US Ratio to
previous
Burmese Romanized
လမြူ la myu 79.9118 mL 2+13⁄16 fl oz 2.70214 fl oz
လမျက် la myet 159.824 mL 5+5⁄8 fl oz 5.40428 fl oz 2
လမယ် la me 319.647 mL 11+1⁄4 fl oz 10.8086 fl oz 2
စလယ် sa le 639.294 mL 1+1⁄8 pints 1.35107 pints 2
ခွက် hkwet 1.27859 L 1+1⁄8 qt 1.35107 qt 2
ပြည် pyi 2.55718 L 2+1⁄4 qt 2.70214 qt 2
စိတ် seit 10.2287 L 2+1⁄4 gallons
1+1⁄8 pecks		 2.70214 gallons
1.16106 pecks		 4
ခွဲ hkwe 20.4574 L 4+1⁄2 gallons
2+1⁄4 pecks		 5.40428 gallons
2.32213 pecks		 2
တင်း tin 40.9148 L 9 gallons
1+1⁄8 bushels		 10.8086 gallons
1.16107 bushels		 2

Money
Table of money units
Unit Equivalent to
Burmese Romanized pya mu mat nga mu kyat
ပြား 1 pya 1 1⁄10 1⁄25 1⁄50 1⁄100
မူး 1 mu 10 1 2⁄5 1⁄5 1⁄10
မတ် 1 mat 25 2+1⁄2 1 1⁄2 1⁄4
ငါးမူး 5 mu (nga mu) 50 5 2 1 1⁄2
ကျပ် 1 kyat 100 10 4 2 1

Adoption of SI (metric) system
Speed limit road sign using kilometres per hour in Amarapura

In October 2013, the Ministry of Commerce announced that Myanmar was preparing to adopt the International System of Units (SI) as the country's official system of measurement.[3]

Examples of metrication in Myanmar include weather forecasts by the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology being given with temperatures in Celsius.[8] Petrol in Myanmar is sold with prices in Burmese kyat per litre (K/L).[9][10] Speed limits in Myanmar are given by law in kilometres per hour (km/h).[11][12]

References
  1. "The World Factbook, Appendix G: Weights and Measures". Web Pages. Central Intelligence Agency. 2010. Archived from the original on 28 May 2010. Retrieved 10 May 2010.
  2. Gyi, Ko Ko (18–24 July 2011). "Ditch the viss, govt urges traders". Business and Property. The Myanmar Times. Translated by Thit Lwin. Myanmar. Archived from the original on 20 September 2011. Retrieved 4 March 2023.
  3. "Myanmar to adopt metric system". www.elevenmyanmar.com. Eleven Media Group. Archived from the original on 24 March 2015. Retrieved 2 November 2015.
  4. "Public Works, Fields Of Activities". Web Page. Ministry Of Construction. 2006. Archived from the original on 1 February 2010. Retrieved 11 May 2010.
  5. "Housing Development". web page. Ministry Of Construction. 2006. Archived from the original on 1 February 2010. Retrieved 11 May 2010.
  6. "Ministry of Agriculture and Information". Web Page. Myanmar Agriculture. 2009–2010. Archived from the original on 13 June 2013. Retrieved 11 May 2010.
  7. "About Myanmar : Geography". web page. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Myanmar. 2009. Archived from the original on 5 August 2010. Retrieved 11 May 2010.
  8. "City Weather Forecast for States and Regions | Department of Meteorology and Hydrology". www.moezala.gov.mm. Archived from the original on 24 December 2017.
  9. Fuel prices on the rise | The Myanmar Times
  10. Petrol Prices March 2014 in Yangon, Myanmar
  11. Road Safety in Myanmar (Road Safety 2030 High level Action For Road Safety) - Recommendations of an Expert Mission invited by the Government of Myanmar and supported by the Suu Foundation. Paris, April 2017, page 13 of 21 "A national speed limit law featuring maximum speed limits on urban roads (48 km/h) and rural roads (80 km/h)"
  12. Strict speed limit enforcement begins in Mandalay | The Myanmar Times

Bibliography
  • "Myanmar, Metric and British equivalents in weights & measures". Myanmar–English Dictionary. Department of the Myanmar Language Commission, Ministry of Education, Union of Myanmar.

See also
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